The War in the Air
by
H. G. WELLS
Contents
I - Of Progress and the Smallways Family
II - How Bert Smallways Got Into Difficulties
III - The Balloon
IV - The German Air-Fleet
V - The Battle of the North Atlantic
VI - How War Came to New York
VII - The "Vaterland" is Disabled
VIII - A World at War
IX - On Goat Island
X - The World Under the War
XI - The Great Collapse
Epilogue
PREFACE TO REPRINT EDITION
The reader should grasp clearly the date at which this book was
written. It was done in 1907: it appeared in various magazines
as a serial in 1908 and it was published in the Fall of that
year. At that time the aeroplane was, for most people, merely a
rumour and the "Sausage" held the air. The contemporary reader
has all the advantage of ten years' experience since this story
was imagined. He can correct his author at a dozen points and
estimate the value of these warnings by the standard of a decade
of realities. The book is weak on anti-aircraft guns, for
example, and still more negligent of submarines. Much, no
doubt, will strike the reader as quaint and limited but upon much
the writer may not unreasonably plume himself. The
interpretation of the German spirit must have read as a
caricature in 1908. Was it a caricature? Prince Karl seemed a
fantasy then. Reality has since copied Prince Carl with an
astonishing faithfulness. Is it too much to hope that some
democratic "Bert" may not ultimately get even with his Highness?
Our author tells us in this book, as he has told us in others,
more especially in The World Set Free, and as he has been telling
us this year in his War and the Future, that if mankind goes on
with war, the smash-up of civilization is inevitable. It is
chaos or the United States of the World for mankind. There is no
other choice. Ten years have but added an enormous conviction to
the message of this book. It remains essentially right, a
pamphlet story--in support of the League to Enforce Peace.
K.
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